Digital Garden

Aegle marmelos

Bel

Scientific Name: Aegle marmelos

Common Name: Bel

Aegle Marmelos

Scientific Name- Aegle Marmelos

Common name- Bael

Family- Rutaceae

Habit type- Tree

Leaves- Its leaves are trifoliate, having round base and pointed tip. Young leaves are light green and matured leaves are dark green in colour.

Bark- The bark is brownish or grey in colour, contains a number of straight long spines. It contains gums which often comes out from wounded branches and then becomes solid. These gums can be explained as a clear, gummy sap. It is sweet at first taste and then irritating to the throat.

Flowers- The flowers are greenish or yellowish in colour and bisexual in nature. Generally, it is visible with new leaves.

Fruits- The bael fruit has a hard-outer jacket and having a diameter of approximately 5 to 12 centimeters. It is green in unripe condition and changes to yellowish brown when ripen. It contains upto 20 orange pulp in the inside.

Medicinal importance and Significance-

·  Ripe fruit pulps are consumed raw or by making juices. The pulp is laxative and it is also considered medicinal for indigestion and constipation.

·  The unripe fruit is boiled or roasted to use as medicine for dysentery and diarrhoea. Sliced immature fruit is dried under the sun and use to prepare a kind of drink called "Bel tea" which is considered medicine for heart disease.

·    Bael is a sacred plant for the Hindus. The fruit and the trifoliate leafs are an essential for Lord Shiva and Goddess Durga Puja.